


Doll

by somekindaspacecadet



Series: Decamber 2020 [3]
Category: Doctor Who
Genre: Academy Era, Decamber, F/M, I promise I will let kos experience happiness soon, Implied/Referenced Character Death, M/M, The Deca - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-04
Updated: 2020-12-04
Packaged: 2021-03-09 21:54:40
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27873385
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/somekindaspacecadet/pseuds/somekindaspacecadet
Summary: Magnus suggests that the remaining members of the Deca clean out Millennia and Rallon's room together so they can begin to move on.
Relationships: Millennia (Doctor Who)/Rallon (Doctor Who), The Doctor | Theta Sigma/The Master | Koschei (Doctor Who: Academy Era)
Series: Decamber 2020 [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2037277
Comments: 2
Kudos: 10





	Doll

**Author's Note:**

> :(
> 
> Day three of Decamber from @starryeyedgazer on Tumblr.

Three months wasn’t enough time. Koschei didn’t think that any amount of time would have been enough. The room would have still looked exactly like they left it. The bedsheets would still be tucked in neatly over the makeshift double bed. Rallon’s favorite scarf would still be draped over the closet door. Because I’m not letting a Guardian of Time wreck my favorite scarf, he’d said. Millennia’s pens and sketchbooks would still be carefully stacked on her desk, each item with its place. No one had so much as taken a step into the room since the day their friends had never come back, and it could have stayed that way forever, waiting for them to walk back in some evening, tired and happy from some exhilarating adventure.

But that didn’t make sense, Koschei supposed. Because they never would.

It was Magnus who had suggested they go through the room. He’d brought up the idea in his tentative way, over one of their breakfasts (a tradition silently upheld in the months after what had happened, which never failed to feel uncanny with only six people). It’ll help, he’d said. We’ll get closure. Make sure their things are kept safe. They would have wanted us to keep going.

And here they all were now, somber in the late morning sunlight. It was Ushas who broke the silence first. Her delicate scientist’s fingers brushed across a faded paper secured to the wall with tape. She gingerly tugged at the corners to detach it and turned to Koschei. “She kept a lot of these. She would have wanted you to have them.”

The page displayed lumpy circles, splayed across the page in colorful ink, which simply read Koschei Oakdown. Koschei blinked at the pressure against the back of his eyes. He couldn’t muster up a defensive reply, for once, and said “I remember. All I could write was my name at first. I wrote it over and over.” He took the paper from Ushas. “I gave them to her as presents. I don’t know what she’d want with a bunch of pages that just have my name on them.”

“It looks like they meant a lot to her.” Drax smiled fondly. “Mill kept the weirdest stuff, didn’t she? Remember when Jelpax baked some cookies for Mother’s Day and she kept one until it got all hard and dusty?”

Jelpax chuckled. “I still think Rallon gave it to one of the rats.”

“He knew I keep them on a very specific diet. He never would have done that.” Ushas’s voice was devoid of its usual sting.

“Oh, look,” Mortimus called out forlornly. “My orchid.” He picked up a china pot from the windowsill, which now contained only a single shriveled bloom and its dried stem. “It probably didn’t last long. I had to remind Rallon to water it every day anyway.” His voice wobbled a little bit as he brushed some dirt from the pot. He looked up at the others. “Would it be all right if I take this? Maybe-- maybe I could use some of that revitalizing serum you’ve been working on, Ushas. I could try to give it a second chance.”

Ushas nodded. “It’s worth a try.”

A small smile tugged at Mortimus’s lips, and he hugged the container to his chest. Koschei remembered, then, that the orchid had been white with pink spots. Rallon had been so proud, but Mortimus was right-- he always forgot to mist it with the special sprayer Mortimus had given him.

Slowly, the room began to fill with quiet movement. Ushas tugged open Millennia’s desk drawers and began separating some of her papers-- notes to Rallon, engineering designs, graded tests and essays. Mortimus found a cloth and pulled back the curtains to gently dust the windowsill. Jelpax had set down some of the boxes he’d carried in and was starting to fill them, starting by folding Rallon’s scarf and tucking it into the bottom. Magnus and Drax began stacking up armfuls of books, stopping to remember what each one had been about, who had enjoyed reading it the most, where they had found it. Koschei made his way to the bed, feeling as if he were wading through thick syrup. He sat down slowly. Something on Millennia’s nightstand glittered. He closed his hand around a pair of earrings, small silver ones with little green stones.

“Whose were those?” Jelpax asked, looking over his shoulder at Kos. “Not Mill’s, right?”

Koschei shook his head. “She never wore jewelry. These are Theta’s.” His throat burned. “He had just gotten them. He must have left them here, um-- right before.”

A tear rolled down his face before he could even try to stop it. He swiped it away quickly, but it was only a moment before another one fell to take its place. He took a deep, shuddering breath, and pressed his hand against his mouth, squeezing his eyes shut.

“Kos, we don’t have to get through all of this today.” Magnus’s hand was heavy on his shoulder. “Need a break?”

Koschei shook his head. “It doesn’t-- it’ll still be like this, and then Borusa will get someone to clean the room out eventually, and--...”

“We’ll make sure he doesn’t,” Drax said determinedly. “We have more of a right to all this than he does.”

“And he hasn’t done it yet.” Mortimus shrugged. “Maybe he wasn’t planning on doing it anyway. Less work for him.”

“The point is,” Magnus added softly. “We can always leave and lock the door and come back tomorrow. That’s always an option. There’s no need to torture ourselves by trying to push through if it’s too much. That isn’t the point, is it?”

“S-sure.” Koschei held onto the earrings in his fist tightly. This was agony, knowing that the people who would have been there for him in an instant in a moment like this would never be again. He could almost feel Millennia’s hand in his, and Rallon’s arm across his shoulders. And Theta-- Theta. Koschei had already worn himself thin, barely able to sleep or eat, spending hours trying to piece together where he could have gone. No response from Lungbarrow, no sign of him anywhere-- not that Koschei knew many people outside the Academy he could ask. He knew it was likely Vansell had taken him into custody, and he couldn’t bear to think about what that would mean. He woke up every day and walked through his life like it was a stupid book he’d gotten sick of reading the seventieth time around. What the hell was he supposed to do now? Where was there to go from here, with just the broken shards of a Deca, no Theta, no mothers?

Maybe Magnus was right. Maybe this was too much.

“I’m just going to put these away,” he managed hoarsely. Koschei pushed himself off the bed and strode out of the room, feeling his friends’ sympathetic eyes on his back as he let his feet carry him automatically back to his room. He swung the door shut behind himself and flopped onto his bed, allowing himself to be consumed by jagged breaths and stinging tears. Theta’s earrings were stabbing into his palms. He was so tired, so drained from trying not to think of Millennia and Rallon all day.

He’d walked with them to sneak into the driving classroom and take a TARDIS. He remembered being so annoyed that they’d chosen to take Theta’s side, to go off on this idiotically dangerous quest. He’d snapped at Theta, demanded to know why he never thought about these things, why he had to run around so carelessly. Theta had been so high on adrenaline, of course, that it barely made him pause. I’ll be fine, Kos. I’m always fine. He’d said something stupid to try and make Kos laugh, like Keep the bed warm for me, honey, I’ll be home before you know it. It hadn’t worked.

Rallon had hugged him so tightly before he got into the TARDIS. Millennia had winked at Koschei and told him that Theta would have found a way to go on his own anyway, so it was better that they all go and look out for each other. That she loved him and she’d be back to help him with the project he’d been stressing about before he knew it.

Hours had turned into days. Annoyance had soured to anxiety. And when Theta had finally come running out of the TARDIS and straight into Kos’s arms, he’d just known.

He knew he couldn’t live in this forever, in pain and disconnect and exhaustion. But what came next?

He unfurled his fingers. Find Theta. The green earrings glinted. Clean the room. Make a plan. Find Theta. He could do that, he thought. Running after Theta came pretty naturally, at least.

Millennia and Rallon would have convinced him to put on the earrings. They would have agreed with Theta that they looked lovely, or matched his eyes, or something. Koschei dropped them onto his desk, wiped his face, and grabbed his backpack from the chair. It was time for a trip to Lungbarrow.

**Author's Note:**

> My tumblr: @wild-endeavor


End file.
